'Not a single telecom company contributed a penny to COVID:' SC on AGR dues

In what comes as a small relief to telecom companies, the Supreme Court today stated that it will reconsider providing them with more time to pay their pending Annual Gross Revenue (AGR) dues. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court also directed the Centre to reconsider demanding the dues from various Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) calling it a "misuse" of the Supreme Court judgment on the issue.

Various telecom companies including Airtel, Vodafone-Idea and Tata have been asked to file affidavits to show how they propose to complete the payment of the dues amounting to over Rs. 1.5 lakh crores.

Solicitor General of India Tushar Mehta arguing before the Supreme Court bench of Justices Arun Mishra, Abdul Nazeer and MR Shah stated before the Supreme Court that demanding the entire amount from the telecom companies in one go "might disrupt the telecom services with some operators shutting down operations".

In the light of this, the Solicitor asked the Supreme Court to allow setting up of a timeline to allow the companies to pay the pending dues.

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'Consumer will finally suffer'

Mehta went on to say that an upfront payment from all companies in one go will adversely impact the telecom sector in such a way that "the consumers will finally suffer". The bench, at this point, raised concerns on what guarantee exists to say that the companies will ensure due payment in tune with the timeline. In this regard, the bench asked if the telecom companies were ready to give an undertaking before the top court to state that the payments will be made on time.

The bench also raised questions on how the Centre had raised a demand for the dues against various PSUs.

"No demands were made for 30 years, but orders were issued after our judgement," Justice Mishra said. These demands are "wholly impermissible" the Supreme Court said.

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The bench also asked the telecom companies if they had made any contribution towards the fight against COVID in the time of the pandemic. Several companies including Airtel, Vodafone-idea and Tata stated that they had contributed crores of rupees to the PM Cares Fund. Kapil Sibal, who was representing Airtel, told the Supreme Court that as part of their CSR Fund, Airtel had contributed Rs. 100 crores to the PM Cares Fund.

The Supreme Court has adjourned the matter until next Thursday.

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